How Joe Biden's campaign hopes to overcome his age problem
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Loading... - Guntur Sinaga
- 26 Apr 2023
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Time waits for no man, the saying goes - and for 80-year-old Joe Biden, that could be a problem. Can the US president convince voters that his age is not an issue?
Mr Biden announced on Tuesday that he wants to serve another four years in the White House. Americans, according to a recent NBC News poll, aren't so sure.
The survey shows that 70% of Americans - and 51% of Democrats - think he shouldn't seek re-election. And it identifies one major concern for about half of those who want him to stand aside in 2024: his age.
Mr Biden is already the oldest president in US history. If he were to win re-election, he would be inaugurated at age 82 and finish his second four-year term at 86. According to US government actuarial tables, the average life expectancy for an 82-year-old man is 6.77 years, with an 8% chance of death within the next 12 months.
The video, which broadly outlines his plan to protect "personal freedoms" and warns against threats posed by his Republican opponents, does not tackle the age issue head on. Instead, it intersperses cuts of an animated president - jogging here, looking engaged there - set to swelling instrumental music.
The video also repeatedly highlights Vice-President Kamala Harris, who would take over the presidency if Mr Biden were incapacitated. At 58, the Biden team may hope her presence injects a bit of life and energy into the campaign. Then Vice-President Biden, it should be noted, was missing from Barack Obama's 2012 re-election video.
The video is not going to be enough, according to veteran political consultant Bob Shrum, director of the Center for the Political Future and a former senior adviser to the presidential campaigns of Democrats Al Gore and John Kerry.
"You answer age questions by running a vigorous campaign," Mr Shrum said. "You don't answer it by talking about it." Read More…
